Alerts & Reporting

Prepaid Card Scam

If the offer sounds too good to be true, it’s probably a scam. Keep reading to learn how they get you to do what they want.

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HOW IT WORKS

The caller starts by confirming all is good with your service. Then, they say you’ve been approved for a substantial discount or a great upgrade. All you have to do is pay a few months in advance on a prepaid gift card. What the bad guy wants is your money on a gift card which cannot be traced or refunded.

These bad guys can be very persuasive and make their call sound legitimate. They may even send you a fake promo code on your phone and ask you to read it back when you get it. That “promo code” is likely a temporary PIN giving them access to your account. Once they have it, they can make changes and charges, which you end up paying.

Once they have that access, the bad guys might even make real changes to your account to further trick you. They make a change, but you get the notification and believe it is legitimate.

What To Do

Hang up and do not share any personal or account information, including the fake promo code that you received from them.

Do not send them money or a prepaid gift card.

Yes, from time to time companies do offer discounts and special service deals.

No, companies will NOT ask you to send payment on a prepaid card, especially from an unrelated company or service.

If you get a scam call like this, call the customer service number on your bill and let the company know. The company can also confirm whether you are eligible for any legitimate discounts or upgrades.

More Information

To make the scam appear legitimate, the bad guys may spoof a company phone number. To learn more about spoofing and how to better protect yourself, read this Cyber Aware blog on spoofing.

The reason for my call is to inform you that your account has been qualified for discounted rates for your existing services for the next two years and your monthly bill will drop to only $62.50. That is a fixed billing plan for the next two years and on top of that you will get a free upgrade to 300 HD channels five movie premium channels and 31 HD sports channels. How does this promotion sound to you?

In order to activate this promotion, you have to prepay your account for the first four months in advance to the billing department. At $62.50 a month, our first prepay amount will be $250. After paying $250 you will not receive any bill from DIRECTV for four months and after that you will begin paying the monthly rate of $62.50 for the next 20 months. If you prepay $250 today, you will also get a $100 gift card as a complimentary gift from our sponsor partner [large internet retailer]. Is this something you can do today to take advantage of this wonderful offer?

Ok… I am going to transfer your call to a promotion specialist who will generate a promo code for you to get this offer. Can you hold on for a few seconds?

(At this point, they send you a fake code.)

Bad Guy:

Can you read me that promo code to confirm? And then, send in a prepaid card along with the code, to our address.

So, when you get a call like this, don’t provide a PIN that has been sent to your phone. Do not send them anything. They will take your money, you will not have those channels added to your service and you will get a bill the next month for your service.

When you call in to complain, the customer service representative will not see any of this as having occurred to your account and will inform you that you have been scammed. You are out $250.

If you question the bad guy, this is how they might try to convince you.

Bad Guy rebuttal:

I understand your concerns but your services will not change and you don’t have to pay over the phone. You don’t have to share any financial information with me. You can save a lot of money over the next two years.

As you know, DIRECTV recently merged with AT&T and now we are revising our rates and we have sponsor partners to help.